Read Serious Poetry with me & Corpsey

[woops]

that bit about being at the service of anyone who'll employ him sounds right

 

[jenks]

One of the great formalists in 20th C poetics IMO, extending Beckett

I think Facing North is one of my favourites of hers - I got into her via Laurie Andersen - that voice/performance thing.

 

[sus]

I'm not yet familiar I'll listen now

 

[Benny Bunter]

Is this the Region, this the Soil, the Clime,
Said then the lost Arch-Angel, this the seat
That we must change for Heav'n, this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? Be it so, since he [ 245 ]
Who now is Sovran can dispose and bid
What shall be right: fardest from him is best
Whom reason hath equald, force hath made supream
Above his equals. Farewel happy Fields
Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrours, hail [ 250 ]
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n. [ 255 ]
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less then he
Whom Thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence: [ 260 ]
Here we may reign secure, and in my choyce
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n.
But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
Th' associates and copartners of our loss [ 265 ]
Lye thus astonisht on th' oblivious Pool,
And call them not to share with us their part
In this unhappy Mansion, or once more
With rallied Arms to try what may be yet
Regaind in Heav'n, or what more lost in Hell? [

"There is a certain half-spurious element in the appreciation of poetry, with which everyone will be familiar, when one takes delight, not only in what is said and in the way it is said, but in a sense of the difficulties overcome - of an obstreperous medium having been masterfully subdued. It is a kind of architectural pleasure. One feels that the poet is working in solid masses, not in something fluid. One is reminded by one's very admiration that 'words are stubborn things'. In English literature Milton's verse presents a particularly striking example of what I mean; and I select a quotation almost at random, hoping it will make my meaning clear:

Fall'n Cherube, to be weak is miserable,
Doing or suffering: but of this be sure—
To do aught good never will be our task,
But ever to do ill our sole delight,
As being the contrary to his high will
Whom we resist. If then his providence
Out of our evil seek to bring forth good,
Our labour must be to pervert that end,
And out of good still to find means of evil.

I do not think we can say that we find this architectural element at all pronounced until the 17th century. It strikes us, for instance, in Milton and the Metaphysicals, and frequently afterwards, but hardly in Chaucer or Shakespeare."

- Owen Barfield

 

[Benny Bunter]

I think Barfield nails it there. It's fascinating how in the half century or so between Shakespeare and Milton you can see the English language solidifying into these solid blocks.

Paradise lost is amazing, but it's always gonna be a notch under Shakespeare cos the language was so much fluid in the Elizabethan era - they had more freedom to play with the language because it was at that sweet spot when it was coming into its own.

 

[sus]

One who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n.

Still, I pity him. He has not mastered the art of Return-Maximizing Reading. The trick is to first assume that you are experiencing a world historically great piece of media, and then figure out how that might be the case.

With this trick, you are no longer subject to the whims of chance, whether you are experiencing a great work of art. Every work of art you experience is great, because you make it so.

 

[Benny Bunter]

I think that's a good trick, but you should still be very selective in what you choose to read. You can't just decide any old piece of shit must be the best thing ever.

 

[luka]

or youll be like barty when he psy-oped himself into liking migos

 

[Benny Bunter]

Reading Barty on Migos is better than listening to Migos, definitely.

 

[version]

One of the annoying things you get with Letterboxd people is deliberately picking shit or maligned films then writing breathless reviews explaining how they're actually a masterpiece and really about capitalism.

 

[version]

Pull some buddy cop film out of the bargain bin then blast out a paragraph on how it's a searing takedown of masculinity and the violence of institutions, maybe throw in a queer reading because it's a couple of men interacting.

 

[Benny Bunter]

I think that's why I tend to trust in older canonical stuff and am more willing to put the time in to understand it even if I don't really like it or get it on first contact. You feel like there must be something in it. I don't want to waste time on minor stuff, you've only got one life.

 

[woops]

i think @sus's point is that you can maximise your enjoyment of life. i don't feel I've ever suffered from the fear of missing out because I've always assumed i was at the best party that night because i was there. that doesn't mean that every party I've been to was the best one that ever happened, but it was better than any of the parties i didn't attend.

 

[Benny Bunter]

i think @sus's point is that you can maximise your enjoyment of life. i don't feel I've ever suffered from the fear of missing out because I've always assumed i was at the best party that night because i was there. that doesn't mean that every party I've been to was the best one that ever happened, but it was better than any of the parties i didn't attend.

Well yeah, thats good, but relaxing and enjoying whatever party you've happened to end up at without FOMO isn't the same as choosing a book to read or a film to watch - you have much more control.

 

[sus]

Yes I'm very particular still, I'm particular on the basis of whether it interacts with my themes

 

[Benny Bunter]

To bring it back to the thread title of 'serious' poetry - I'm not sure whether the themes have changed that much over time. The stuff that lasts taps into something deep and ancient.

 

[version]

I think that's why I tend to trust in older canonical stuff and am more willing to put the time in to understand it even if I don't really like it or get it on first contact. You feel like there must be something in it. I don't want to waste time on minor stuff, you've only got one life.

I'm not wedded to the canon, but I think you can generally tell when someone genuinely likes or sees something in their choice and when they're taking the piss or more interested in using it as a vehicle for their own posturing. The pisstaking's fine when it's fun, the posturing's awful.

This would be an example of what I'm criticising. A middling shark film reviewed as though it's a piece of avant-garde visual art.

A ★★★★½ review of 47 Meters Down: Uncaged (2019)

johannes roberts is out here at the end of the decade quietly making masterpieces of vapor horror. not just in the sense of a grafted on neon aesthetic and synth soundtrack, but in the sense of the formal relationship he establishes between himself and genre. right as the neo-80s aesthetic has...

letterboxd.com

 

[Benny Bunter]

Yeah that sort of posturing is ridiculous, and you can usually spot it a mile off.

I'm prepared to listen to someone who I reckon has some sort of authority I can trust in though.

 

[Benny Bunter]

I think FOMO is a good motivator when it comes to the established canon of classics, and not good when it's wedded to fashion, or completism or obscurantism.

 

[Benny Bunter]

Dunno if obscurantism is the right word, but you know what i mean